Candidates

This was the last parliamentary by-election in England, Scotland or Wales not contested by an official candidate of either the Liberal Party, the SDP, or their successor party the Liberal Democrats; until the Haltemprice and Howden by-election, 2008. The Social Democrat candidate had no connection to the SDP (which wasn't created until 1981) and achieved the lowest vote for any candidate in a Parliamentary election under universal suffrage, a record later surpassed by the five votes obtained by independent campaigner Bill Boaks in the Glasgow Hillhead by-election of March 1982 .